[umvi]

I've done it with a full time job and two kids[0]. Here's my $0.02

For me I had to constantly reign in the scope to be a minimum viable game. I would let my imagination run wild and come up with all these grand ideas for an overarching plot, etc. But the project gets really hard to finish after you've done the fun bits like getting the main gameplay mechanics implemented and there's a big stretch of grunt work ahead ("the last 20% takes 80% of the work"). It's easy to let it languish and never ship/release. That's when you need to re-evaluate what it takes to achieve a minimum viable game and ruthlessly reign in the scope.

Tell yourself "I can implement all my other grand ideas if this minimum viable game proves successful" - and you can. And if it isn't very successful, then you can move onto the next project/idea.

[0] https://www.bryanpg.com/games/embergram